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Section 3 Part II: Citizen Journalism’s Contributions to Traditional Media
High risk coverage Many times journalists find themselves unable to access the places where newsworthy events are unfolding. Natural disasters, armed conflicts and other high risk situations can hinder media’s capacity to offer accurate and timely reports about important happenings. In these scenarios, on-the-ground witnesses are of paramount importance for the media because their reports might be their only connection to these types of events. Andy Carvin, famous for his Twitter coverage of the Arab spring, has experimented enough with UGC that he has been able to build a network of trustworthy sources who assist his reporting not only by providing information, but by fulfilling the responsibilities of producers, editors, researchers. Carvin was not the only one to lean on citizen journalists to build up his coverage. A study by the USIP PeaceTech Initiative examined the news coverage of the Syrian civil war and determined that many traditional media outlets relied heavily on UGC to cover the conflict. Most of this content were photos and video footage that helped both activists and media to build up a case around the brutality and illegitimacy of al-Assad’s regime. The USIP study notes that “many networks developed elaborate in-house shops to locate, authenticate, and curate video evidence,” which points to an increasingly systematic incorporation of UGC in traditional news media content. However, other events, such as the Boston Marathon bombing, highlight the risks involved with a heavy reliance on social media for reporting breaking news. The inaccuracies that spread on social media and the mishandling of this information by traditional media led to more confusion and risk. Legacy media outlets’ credibility got tarnished after their poorly conceived coverage. Therefore, the management of UGC still requires high levels of professionalism, which sometimes comes down to the almost obsessive practice of verification. To be fair, information overload is a reality that affects the production of high quality journalism. The pressure on journalists to distribute timely content often conflicts with the corroboration process. Crises also tend to drag their chaotic nature to their coverage. Time magazine’s journalist Jonathan Fitzgerald, in his analysis of the Boston bombing coverage, provides us with a useful metaphor to understand the processes of news production from a more forgiving perspective: “If journalism is the first rough draft of history, eyewitness reports captured on mobile phones and broadcast to the world are the first notes—scratchings, written hastily on Post-its, which later become an outline that eventually inform the first draft as well as the drafts that follow. They are hastily scribbled and stuck in the moment, but later, when a skilled storyteller comes along, they begin to take shape into a cohesive narrative.” Share links about news stories developing in hostile environments that were taken to the world’s attention thanks to digital media and prosumers. Also, let us know about cases in which the legacy media made a good or a bad job in collaborating with citizen journalists. International cases are VERY welcome!